By Tom Vaughan in The Business — Dec 9, 2025

Where do you get your legitimacy?

If you had hundreds of people who wanted you to read their screenplay, what would it take for you to choose one over the others?

Help me, help you.

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In 1993, I queried nearly every screenwriting and playwriting agent I could get the address for. This was back when you sent actual letters.

My memory is fuzzy, but it has to be 30 agents. At least.

I didn't send anything to CAA because it seemed ridiculous.

They were so big, and I had read somewhere about how they slapped foolish query letters up on the mail room wall to mock them.

I wasn't going to be on that wall!

I had just dropped out of college, and the only thing I had going for me was a letter of introduction from my writing teacher, Edward Albee.

But that was it. The loglines were terrible, and I'm sure there were other rookie mistakes.

I ended up sending a couple of plays out, but no takers. No one was interested. Why would they be?

There was no compelling reason to read my work. I was asking, hoping, thinking, "If they just read my stuff, they will love it."

I had no legitimacy and neither did my project.

Around that time, I self-produced a play I wrote in Houston.

It got some nice reviews, including a prominent one in the main Houston paper. That review found its way to the desk of a young agent at CAA. The one place I didn't bother sending a query to!

That agent called me and soon became my rep. That launched my screenwriting career.

What was the difference between those boutique agencies I sent letters to with names I can't even remember and CAA?

Perception. That's all.

I was the exact same writer. Nothing was different there.

But my soon-to-be agent didn't see me as a college kid pleading with him to read his play. He saw me as a young, produced playwright with possible upside.

I had legitimacy that made it seem I was worth reading. That was it.

There are two giant hurdles for the early screenwriter.

Writing a great screenplay.
Getting that screenplay read by the right person at the right time.

We spend the vast majority of our time on the first one. It is, after all, the thing we have the most control over.

But when a screenwriter is finally ready to take the giant leap to going pro, #2 is just as vital.

To the screenwriter, it feels like it's the final scene of their adventure. The payoff to their long journey of actually getting good at this.

Yet, often it's just the midpoint. Or worse. The Act 1 break.

Because what we often find in getting our screenplay read is resistance. One roadblock after another.

How do we get someone who can make a difference to read this damn thing?

You have worked so hard to get (hopefully) good at this, and now you can't seem to get anyone to read your (hopefully) good screenplay!

You go from something in your control — learning to write better — to something completely out of your control:

Someone deciding to read your screenplay.

You must remember that no one owes you a read.

It is a BIG ask. It takes time, and it takes energy. And the reader knows that a 99% chance it's going to be a pass.

There are more screenplays written than an entire industry has time to read.

It's why an entire sub-industry sprung up to filter through them all!

Most of these screenplays are not very good.

From a mathematical perspective, yours is almost certainly one of the tens of thousands not worth reading.

And yet, it remains your job to give the person a reason to believe there is a chance:

Your screenplay can make them money.
It will do so in an amount of effort that will make it worth it.

But how do you do that if you can't get anyone to read it in the first place?

If you want to offer a legitimate shot that your screenplay is worth reading, where do you get that legitimacy?

The reason they read.

Other than knowing you personally, there are three basic ways someone can decipher if a screenplay has a shot of being worth their time.

It's pre-scrutinized.

Someone they respect has read it, and they like it and think it's worth reading. Even better if they know them personally.

Attachments count. If a big star is attached, a director or producer, then it can be presumed there is something interesting there.

This is the most valuable, as it also means the screenplay is being passed around.

By definition, it's not a first step, so a lot of things have to happen to get here.

The logline/concept is exciting.

I have written extensively about this, and even teach the course Concept is King about it.

This is when the idea of the screenplay, communicated through the logline, clearly offers up a commercial project they can sell.

It's not the language of the logline or the format that matters. It's the concept inside the logline that counts.

A great idea does the work for you. It just plain sounds like something they can make money from.

The writer themselves has legitimacy.

They could already be a successful screenwriter, novelist, playwright, actor, director, or have some kind of adjacent background.

Perhaps their story is interesting as it relates to the screenplay. For example, it's a screenplay about L.A. Firefighters written by a 20-year veteran firefighter.

Or a screenplay about female reporters covering the presidential campaign, written by a veteran female reporter who covered presidential campaigns.

Remember: none of these mean the screenplay is any good.

It just means it may be worth looking at to see if it's any good.

Know where you are and what you have on your side.

The biggest mistake people make is that they try to get their work read too early.

I don't mean sending a script out for feedback. I mean querying producers, agents, and managers.

They send emails with mediocre loglines or try to "sell" the project by claiming how big the market is or what a huge franchise it will be.

Keep in mind: the logline and your query letter don't just tell the reader about your screenplay.

That logline you pitch also reveals if you have some basics down on the business, understand the market, and can recognize a good story idea.

You're not just revealing the screenplay. You're exposing you. And too often, the message is, "This person doesn't get it," or, "This person isn't ready."

They will be happy to pass based on that.

Remember: It is perfectly okay to be in the phase of your career where you are just trying to get better.

If you genuinely think you're ready for next steps…

Make sure your strategy, your screenplay, and your goals are aligned.

If you have a small project that does not offer up a great logline, that's fine. But you must account for that. You must accept it. Complaining about how the business doesn't like smaller movies does as much good as complaining about traffic.

This is where you lose the mental battle.

Sure, it feels good to be momentarily right and to point out that traffic is wrong, but it makes no difference whatsoever.

Query letters with less than phenomenal loglines have a 99.9% failure rate.

Trying to sell a spec script with less than an engaging concept and no attachments has a 99.9% failure rate.

If this is the case for you, you will likely have to find another way to get it going.

That's a topic for another email, but it includes relationship building, credibility building, and other ways where you build your own legitimacy, and the project borrows from that, rather than you borrowing legitimacy from the project.

Is your goal from jump to sell your screenplay?

Then focus on the concept.

Different buyers want different concepts, but it still comes down to an easily communicable idea that generates great scenes.

Whatever the situation is, make sure the project and your goals for it align.

It's not a favor.

You cannot get people to read your screenplay by hoping they will do you a favor.

I know the thought process. I used to have it. "If I can just get them to read it, they will love it."

It is a frustrating approach.

And it doesn't work.

You get someone to read your screenplay by making them feel it's in their interest to do so.

See it from their point of view.

Stop hoping they will read it and look at it from their perspective.

And I don't mean try to overcome objections here, or any of that marketing stuff. No data or box office silliness. None of those things people use to try to convince someone to read their script.

I mean really put yourself in this person's shoes.

Why would they want to read your screenplay?

Why read this project above all the others? What is the thing that would get them excited?

What would compel them to say, "Please send that."

If you had hundreds of people who wanted you to read their screenplay, what would it take for you to choose one over the others?

What would you need for you to think, "This one might be good."

Now, ask yourself, why would someone want to read yours?

Where does your legitimacy come from?

The concept?

Your personal and unique connection to the material?

Your previous commercial success as a writer?

The people that you're associated with?